BSG Team Ventures is pleased to have assisted in the recent search for Telkonet’s new Executive Vice President, Sales & Marketing.

Subscribing to the renewable energy industry mantra, “Efficiency is the first fuel,” Telkonet provides energy efficiency systems for residency intensive buildings.

BSG Team Ventures completed the search in 90 calendar days.  Key success attributes for the executive sought included deep experience and credibility with the ESCo (energy services company) industry, power purchase agreements, and energy performance contract creation within the commercial sector, including hotels, government, and education.

Telkonet, Inc. (www.telkonet.com) develops, manufactures, and sells energy efficiency and smart grid networking technology products and platforms in the United States and Canada. Its powerline communications technology (PLC) utilizes a building’s internal electrical wiring as a data communications network, turning power outlets into data ports while leaving the electrical functionality unaffected. The company offers Telkonet SmartEnergy products, including thermostats, sensors, controllers, and wireless networking products, as well as Networked Telkonet SmartEnergy platforms that incorporate Recovery Time technology for the monitoring of climate conditions and automatically adjust a room’s temperature accounting for the presence or absence of an occupant. It also provides smart grid networking technology products comprising Telkonet iWire System and Telkonet Series 5 PLC products, which include gateways, extenders, couplers, and ibridges to transform a site’s existing internal electrical infrastructure into an Internet protocol. In addition, the company offers high-speed wireless Internet access solutions and technology to the hospitality industry. It serves the hospitality, education, healthcare, and government/military markets.

For the full Telkonet corporate press release, see  http://www.marketwire.com/press-release/Telkonet-Appoints-Gerrit-Reinders-New-Executive-Vice-President-for-Sales-Marketing-OTCQB-TKOI-1405366.htm .

BSG Team Ventures has been retained to recruit the UK Managing Director and Advisory Board Directors  for a new British energy generation business that targets the commercial customer with a unique onsite co-generation solution that reduces their cost of heat and power while at the same time requiring no up front capital expenditure nor addition of employee overhead.

You can think of it as an “On-Site Utility” offering clean electricity, heat, hot water and cooling to hotel, healthcare, and multifamily housing properties in the United Kingdom. The company sells the energy produced on-site as an alternative to the outright sale of energy equipment; designing, installing, owning, operating and maintaining the complete CHP system. Customers pay only for the energy they need and use, at a rate guaranteed to be below their local utility rates, via a prenegotiated power purchase agreement.

Reporting directly to the President of the parent company, the UK Managing Director is responsible for all activities of the subsidiary.

Essential Job Functions/Responsibilities

Below is a Venn diagram of the success attributes for the Managing Director position–

Energy Efficiency Systems for Residency Intensive Buildings

“Efficiency is the First Fuel”

Our client develops, manufactures, and sells energy efficiency and smart grid networking technology products and platforms in the United States and Canada. Its powerline communications technology.

The Position

The Vice President of Sales for the Smart Energy division will report to the CEO, and be responsible for all revenue generating activities within the division.

Essential Responsibilities

• - Divisional revenue ownership
• - Sales team-building
• - Sales & marketing strategy (sales, marketing, operations)
• - Sales leadership and sales pipeline management
• - Developing and managing detailed budgeting & forecasting
• - Developing sales and distribution plan
• - Developing partnerships in upstream indirect sales channels
• …

Ideal Candidate Profile

The diagram below illustrates the intersection of competencies critical in the VP Sales position:

Compensation

Compensation is competitive with the position’s requirements.  In a performance-based environment, this will include base salary, incentive bonus structure based on both individual, department, and corporate qualitative and quantitative MBOs, and a stakeholder position in the company.

As Chair of this year’s 2010 Finals, I would like to welcome you to the 6^th Annual Ignite Clean Energy Competition here at Babson College.

There are two simple messages I would like to share this year.

The first— We have reunited West Coast and East Coast cleantech competitions this year to create now the oldest and largest cleantech competition.  Ignite Clean Energy Competition is now the Northeast regional competition for the national CleanTech Open (www.cleantechopen.com ).  The CleanTech Open now has 5 regional competitions that feed regional winners to a national finals held this year out in Northern California in November.  Participating regions in addition to the Northeast include Rocky Mountain based out of Denver, North Central based out of Minneapolis, Northwest based out of Seattle, and California anchored in the Bay area.  We’re excited to be part of what is a growing organization, and we welcome all interested to participate in any of the other regions and/or spread the word to those you know share our passion for cleantech innovation at the seed stage.

The second message  is a simple “thank you.”  And that thank you is to all volunteers in ICE over the past 6 years, competitors, mentors, sponsors, and other passionate supporters who have sustained our success through the unprecedented growth of the cleantech sector.   From our first year of the competition to 2010, we have seen the New England cleantech ecosystem grow from a small yet unorganized band of passionate visionaries, to a veritable army of well-organized constituents of a new industry sector and connected ecosystem.  The Massachusetts Clean Energy Center, headed by Patrick Cloney, is the latest evolution of our anchor underwiter for Ignite Clean Energy.  Across those 6 years they have made ICE possible, organizations like the New England Clean Energy Council was born and under Nick Darbeloff and now Peter Rothstein’s leadership, they have become the nucleus to no less than a dozen other cleantech-related organizations in New England from the Massachusetts Hydrogen Coalition (http://www.massh2.org/ )to the Clean Economy Network (http://www.cleaneconomynetwork.org ), from New England’s own cleantech-focused angel investing group, Clean Energy Venture Group (http://www.cleanenergyvg.com ) to a website dedicated exclusively to cleantech ecosystem events CleanTech Boston (www.cleantechboston.com).

Is it a fad?  A bubble? Unlikely.  Sustainable energy solutions are a fundamental part of making the 21^st century not our last century of civilization as we know it, but rather a bridge to sustainable centuries of civilization, innovation, and evolution that lie beyond.

The UK’s sustainable energy program is a public-private partnership at work.  And thus far, working well.

I recently had the opportunity to participate in what has become an annual “Cleantech Trade Mission” of Boston and New York cleantechers to the United Kingdom.    Our hosts?  The UK Trade & Investment team based here in the Northeast, part of the large mandate of the British Consulate  here in the U.S. to continue to put planks in the bridge between our two countries, especially when it comes to cleantech and sustainable energy solutions.

Although I joined midweek as was over there for a European-based executive search we were interviewing on, the group moved from North to South, starting on Monday up in Edinburgh, Scotland, then down through Newcastle, Cambridge, and ending with two days in London.

It was a comprehensive gathering of the UK cleantech ecosystem for an exchange of ideas and “show-and-tell” around the UK of their commitment to sustainability and cleantech thought leadership.   Our US band of cleantech brethren among others included investors from Rockport Capital and Kleiner Perkins.

There were  three notable differences between the UK and US surrounding renewable energy & cleantech:

1) Government superstructure like the Carbon Trust (keep in mind, the UK has cap-and-trade and the U.S. doesn’t) Cap & trade drives a true dynamic market in the UK while the US version is still mired in politics on Capitol Hill.  The UK succeeded in passing sweeping energy-related legislation in 2008 (http://www.carbontrust.co.uk/about-carbon-trust/pages/default.aspx ), and the result has been a fueling of the entrepreneurial engine in Britain to come up with new technologies, sciences, and Internet-driven efficiency and monitoring solutions to help drive adoption and integration of the new laws.

2) Landfills and methane is another interesting difference again brought about by the UK’s progressive legislation.  Britain is an island, and a small one at that compared to the U.S. (60+ million citizens, one fifth the size of the U.S.)   There is limited real estate for landfills, and one of the big offenders from landfill is methane gas.  A host of science-driven entrepreneurs have tackled what is referred to as anaerobic digesters (http://www.foe.co.uk/resource/briefings/anaerobic_digestion.pdf )

3) Massive investment in offshore wind generation capacity is the third area. It was truly remarkable the detail behind Britain’s likely ascendance to global leadership in offshore wind generation.   Historically, Scandinavia has held that claim.  However, with Britain’s aggressive 2020 goals, they’re going to no doubt lead in offshore wind expertise and GW installed base.

Some quick numbers related to the 2020 initiative:

* Capital expenditures:  £14 billion already spent in the last 5  years.

* £5.6 billion more in cap-ex planned for the next 5 years (keep in mind, this is a country with a population of ~ 62 million, about one fifth the size of the United States)

* Closure of 25% of traditional power stations (coal or other non-renewable sources)

* 25% of natural gas generated from UK sources

* Addition of 44GW of offshore wind power at distances up to 200km from shore, and in water depths down to 80m

Something like 40% of energy capacity is going to be wind, with a vast majority of that coming from offshore wind.  However, UK power generators like NationalGrid recognize that there needs to be a large redundancy due to the intermittent nature of wind as a resource.  NationalGrid is planning primary failover in the form of LNG and CCS capacity to power conventional generation, replacing virtually 100% of existing coal-fired plants with carbon-capture versions.  The best hope to reduce this reliance on traditional energy sources is to innovate a wind power storage solution that can be commercialized between now and the completion of the 2020 UK offshore wind initiative.

Britain is pioneering a number of other innovations, including a CO2 transportation network that transports CO2 for storage (think CO2 “pipeline”), taking a chunk of  the industrial complex’s CO2 emissions and capturing, storing and or repurposing it.

After all that cleantech knowledge transfer, what did the UK serve for dessert?  A cocktail party with London-based cleantech entrepreneurs and investors at Taylor Wessing’s offices on the top floor wrap-around patio on a gorgeous London summer evening (below was the mis en scene).

In addition, we had an opportunity to take a sneak peek from “The View, ”  an official viewing site of the 2012 Summer Olympic Park, at the top of an adjacent apartment building in East London that has impressively grown from a former area challenged by urban decay.   And the London Olympics stand to be the greenest one yet from what we were told, with prolific and cool sustainable innovation even built right into the very steps of the stadiums that use spectator energy expended in climbing up and down the stadium to power an LED lighting system.  One of their sustainability goals is to try to construct the Olympic venue with a net-zero carbon footprint.

Footnote:  Rob Dietel, Vice Consul, who heads the cleantech vertical for the British Consulate’s UK Trade & Investment New England office, is a terrific resource along with his colleague, Kevin McCarthy, also out of the Boston office.  Rebecca Lewis is  Rob’s New York-region counterpart. All three are bringing a select group of UK cleantech entrepreneurs to Boston and New York this Fall.  In addition, they’re planning on putting on a one-day “master class” of sorts showcasing UK offshore wind expertise here in the U.S.  Invitation-only, and for those who are lucky enough to get the invite, it should prove to be great content.  For more detail, Rob is at rob.dietel@fco.gov.uk.

Senator Markey addresses the formal-wear only crowd at the JFK Library during Clean Energy Week in November.

An annual event in Boston punches up the fact that we have an incredible cleantech cluster-New England Clean Energy Council’s annual Green Tie Gala.

Although this event took place back during Clean Energy Week in November, I was reminded of it when out in Denver recently.  Denver has some great stuff going for it.  NREL (National Renewable Energy Lab), University of Colorado with multiple campuses in Denver and Boulder that have significant funding from both Federal and State agencies, and a history of technology oriented companies, albeit with a heavy emphasis on telecom (Qwest, Level 3).

However, what there isn’t as much of in Denver is what some call the “ecosystem.” Others call it the “cluster.” This is a body of people who hold different but overlapping responsibilities in the entrepreneurial ecosystem and whose fusion is its wellspring–

• Academics: These are those most often with the new disruptive technology or science breakthrough that serves as the seed of a new company
• Business entrepreneurs: those who have experience taking the seed of an idea, and building a company around it
• Investors: The first friends & family, then angel investors, and often venture capitalists or corporate strategic investors who pour money into these new ideas to fund the business entrepreneurs scale the disruptive idea
• Professional services providers: These are often the “connectors” in the ecosystem. They’re comprised of lawyers, accountants, executive search consultants, and start-up advisors. They act as the glue between the prior three categories, more often than not introducing one to another, supporting the growth of these companies with their area of specialty

[Footnote: If you compare Boston to Silicon Valley however, Boston is shallower in large technology and sciences companies that serve to spawn "runners" to new start-up companies.   The biotech industry is perhaps better in Boston at doing this than the pure technology industry in the last decade, with a growing base of larger biotech and pharma companies including Genzyme, Cubist, Biogen and Sepracor.  Medical devices companies also fair better in many ways to large tech, with Boston Scientific, ThermoFisher, and Perkin Elmer.  In technology hardware and software, beyond EMC, there are precious few large technology companies left in Massachusetts. ]

Details on the Gala?  This year’s Green Tie Gala was held at the JFK Memorial Library in Boston (last year was held at the Museum of Science).    There are many organizations in the innovation sector here in Massachusetts that have done a good job at galvanizing a broad cross section of constituents, including the Mass Biotech Council, as well as MITX (formerly MIMC), and the Massachusetts Technology Leadership Council, or TiE Boston (Indus Entrepreneurs).  However, we’ve had yet to participate in a gathering of any that approaches that of the cleantech cluster here in New England.

Senator Markey gave the opening address to punctuate the cocktail hour.  To a person it seemed, everyone knew everyone.  Yes there were a few outsiders (a small contingent from the UK had come over as part of a trade mission coordinated with Clean Energy Week in Massachusetts because of its target rich calendar), yet all of these were welcomed by the larger fold, and the gathering seemed to virtually breathe together as some sort of larger unified body, a cluster with so few degrees of separation that walking from group to group or table to table was akin to going back to your high school reunion…. You knew at least half those sitting at every table.  For those who have experienced the annual Nantucket Conference, it is this atmosphere if intimacy and familiarity that presides.

To cap the night off, venture capitalist Chuck McDermott of Rockport Capital led his band in an after-hours session that continued the beat of familiarity both given its leader as well as in its musical selection (Chuck stating that the band only plays “songs popularized before 1960″).

Chuck McDermott, leading cleantech venture capitalist at Rockport, moonlighting as 50's music band leader

A weekday morning in late November.  A brownstone residence on Beacon Hill in the shadow of the State House.  A dozen of the foremost experts in technology transfer and intellectual property in the Boston innovation cluster.  And a representative from the Department of Energy.  We at BSG Team Ventures had the recent opportunity to host a salon-style meeting in a home of a friend of the firm during Clean Energy Week here in the Commonwealth (for more on Clean Energy week, see http://greenovationconference.com/conference-info/cew.html).

The purpose?  Bringing the best minds in the Boston venture, entrepreneurship and innovation community together for a brainstorming session with the Department of Energy around best practices in technology transfer out of our national laboratories.   Attending the meeting were Alan Gordon from Harvard University Technology Licensing Office, Chris Noble from MIT’s TLO, head of the Mintz Levin cleantech practice Tom Burton, Peter Rothstein from the New England Clean Energy Council, Director of the Massachusetts Technology Transfer Center Abi Barrow, Director of Partners CIMIT John Collins, General Partner at Flagship Ventures Jim Matheson, and CEOs Chris Hobson and Peter Vandermeulen each running cleantech start ups with technology licensed out of several of the national labs themselves.

The challenge the current Obama Administration is taking on under Secretary of Energy Chu is how to better mine the metaphorical gold created inside the U.S. Department of Energy-funded  national laboratory network of some 15 that are spread across the country.  Some of these labs are household names–Los Alamos and  Sandia (New Mexico), and Lawrence Livermore (California).  Others are less well known-Argonne (Illinois), Brookhaven (NY), and Ames (Iowa).  Even the National Renewable energy Lab (Colorado, known more often as NREL), are not as well known as one would hope.  The history of these national labs springs from energy research spurred by World War II.  What the layperson may remember is that many of these labs were where secretive nuclear energy research was conducted.  However, much of the mandate for these labs some 60 years later is focused on discoveries that will broadly contribute to advancing the United States’ understanding of energy, renewable energy, energy conservation, and all the various scientific disciplines that can contribute-physics, materials engineering, chemistry, and more.  These labs are panning for a 21^st century gold-energy discoveries and breakthroughs that will create new batteries using renewable resources, wean the U.S. dependence on oil and coal as primary energy sources, and break new barriers in energy efficiency.

However, the problem has been that these labs have explored a lot, and engaged in extensive primary research, but have punched below their weight class in bringing innovation from discovery through to successful commercialization.  The DOE budget in FY 2009 topped $25 billion.  The national labs budget made up approximately $10 billion of that.  And with the Obama administration’s  stimulus package, these numbers only look to be increasing.  One example brought up in the conversation to punctuate the problem from one of the Boston-based attendees was that fact that Argonne National Laboratory in the last decade has created less than a dozen successful out licensing/royalty events that generated meaningful returns.   Logic holds that in terms of return-on-investment, there remains much room for added improvement.

So, two hours later, what were the issues that were brought up by the braintrust, and potential solutions that were tendered to improve the return on investment the DOE makes in the national laboratory’s innovation mission?

Some of the key issues with the current structure that came out of the dialogue:

•    Risk aversion of national labs researchers to leave the security of the lab to spearhead a risk-laden venture

•    Innate interest of lab researchers is more geared toward research and “discovery” versus market-matching and commercialization

•    Low/no financial incentive to take a discovery beyond research phase

•    No business ecosystem or business-savvy catalysts to help focus lab research talent on “known problems,” or the sifting through lab breakthroughs to match-make with existing  business  problems

Suggestions for improvement focused around the three ingredients that are key to metaphorical “combustion” of the innovation commercialization engine: More…

I had the opportunity to be out in Denver for the 22^nd Annual National Renewable Energy Lab’s (NREL) Growth Forum.  As many know, the U.S. has more than half a dozen national labs, some of the best known being Los Alamos and Lawrence Livermore, and Sandia.  These labs are scattered across the U.S., and each often has a specific focus (nuclear research for instance is what has kept the National Labs in the public eye most often).

Given the Obama Administration’s commitment to renewable energy and innovation, it was an upbeat gathering.    The attendee list was well-balanced between entrepreneurs, venture capitalists, and academics.  Geographically, the majority of attendees either hailed from the Colorado area (with Boulder as the epicenter for cleantech in CO despite the NREL lab being located in Golden, CO), the West Coast (Silicon Valley entrepreneurs and venture investors), and New England (Boston-skewed).

What was surprising is how small the renewable energy community truly is.  It’s still a very close knit group.  And the community tends to shift from one location to another to pursue the next opportunity to contribute to the national cleantech ecosystem.  Two notable examples are Tod Perry, who now is the Program Manager of the Clean Energy Entrepreneurship Center for NREL.  Tod had originally started as a cleantech entrepreneur 5 years ago in Boston, pioneering a water purification technology, and a contestant in the first Ignite Clean Energy Competition in 2005.  Another Bostonian who’s moved out to Colorado recently is Trent Yang, formerly a principal at Globespan Venture Partners, now Director, Entrepreneurship and Business Development at RASEI in Boulder (Renewable and Sustainable energy institute), part of the University of Colorado commitment to innovation in the renewable energy sector in the Rocky Mountain region.  Other notable Bostonians sited at the conference included Peter Rothstein of New England Clean Energy Council, Bob Metcalfe of Polaris, and Chris Hobson, CEO of BandGap Engineering.

While out there, stopped by the Finals for the Cleantech Open’s Rocky Mountain Finals.  New Sky Energy, Rivertop Renewables, and SunTrac Solar were the winners, now headed to the Cleantech Open Finals for all 3 regions up in Silicon Valley.

For more on the winners, see http://www.metrodenver.org/news-center/metro-denver-news/mayor-hickenlooper-announces-cleantech-open-winners.html

We’re often asked how to establish fair market compensation when it comes to CEOs of privately held companies, often with venture capital or private equity backing.

Below is one method that can be employed as a jumping off point for this calculus:

1)     “De-risked,” how much is a CEO worth?  Is  $500 -$1M a year too much?  For our purposes here, we’re talking about a talented CEO.  Not someone below average, but above the average, one that a retained executive search firm, venture or private equity investor, or board of directors would be proud to put in the role.   Rather than pick some arbitrary number, this should be  ”market set,” by looking at what someone working for any global 2000 company (i.e. General Electric or other similar) earns annually.  From our executive search experience and database of compensation comparables in these companies, base salary is usually between 250K and 400K, depending upon how big the divisional P&L responsibility is, there is usually a bonus that is between 50-100% of base, and an LTIP (long term incentive plan) that-once partial vesting begins-can generate from 100K up to 250K or more a year in cash.

2)     So, the cash component of a comparable, including average base, annual average bonus, and yearly LTIP pay-out looks something like this:

Base ~ 300K

Bonus ~250K

LTIP (cash only) ~ 200K

TOTAL: 750K

* This does not include any meaningful RSUs (restricted stock units) that are usually also part of that package, which could add another 200K or more per year in value to a general manager’s package with true P&L responsibility for their division, group, or sector/segment.

* This is also not indexed to geography/cost of living.  If the position is in New York City tri-state area (New York, northern New Jersey, southern Connecticut), San Francisco, Boston, London, Singapore, Hong Kong, or Tokyo, a multiplier factor needs to be used to level-set for cost of living increase required for those metropolitan areas.

3)      Now, back out the cash portion of a CEO’s compensation for the company that they’re stepping into (say 250K a year in cash in smaller companies as all base, or combination of base + cash bonus).  So you’re left with say 500K that needs to be made up in equity, on a per anum basis.

4)      Over how many years is the liquidity horizon (and/or vesting rate, 3, 4 ,5 years)? Let’s say it’s 4 years, at net 500K, equals ~$2 million

5)      Now, this is with ZERO beta risk factor.  Add back the beta risk of an earlier stage company.  Let’s assume a global 200 company equals “1.”  A CEO role in a privately held, externally backed company is not “1″.  It’s probably a multiplier of 1.5, or 2.  For a pre-revenue, VC-backed company with high burn rate, it could be as much as in the 3 to 5 range.  Note that any illiquid company is inherently risky in terms of cashing in any equity at a reasonable price.  Let’s pick a beta risk multiplier of 2.5 times riskier than “average.” So, 2M * 2.5 = 5M.  Note that when there are preferences for the investors that create an exit hurdle rate before any common shareholders get paid, beta risk goes up accordingly unless the CEO participates in any exit event via cash carve out or other instrument.   As mentioned above, a recent IPO that represents a reasonable market comparable netted a CEO who joined the company 4 years ago $20M.  Using this number, the CEO’s compensation was $5M a year, or a beta multiplier of approximately 5.

6)     Then, are there any combat pay provisions you need to add in (warts that a CEO or executive team member is required to overcome and vanquish in their role that are above and beyond the normal call of duty)-reconstituting the executive team, or raising an outside round of capital because existing investors are tapped out, or starting up an Asia manufacturing capability that will require the CEO to take a dozen 15-hour flights one-way to get up and running.

7)      Finally, you have to look at what likely dilution there is going to be to an initial options grant for the CEO.  If you start with a 6% stake in an early stage company in a Series A funding, and you then raise a series B and C, depending upon valuation for those rounds, the CEO will likely end up below 3% as a “fully diluted” stakeholder.  There is an argument to be made that any of the management team critical to the success of the company will be “topped off” at later funding events in order to keep them motivated.  However, there is no guarantee that this happens.  It’s only good business sense to do it.  For the CEO, it is more important what s/he ends up with, not how much with which they start.

8)     Add water, and stir…

Notes & disclaimers:

• * This is not intended to be biased in any direction, to any party, neither CEO candidate, nor company and/or investor.
• * This is only one way of calculating compensation, indeed there are many others.
• * There is no way an earl- stage emerging/growth company will be able to compensate a CEO in all cash, nor truly be able to offset the risks inherent in this stage of venture.  The CEO either accepts this, or is not truly capable of working successfully in this milieu.
• * Other than the impact of cost of living  adjustments to base compensation, each CEO candidate comes with what we refer to as their own subjective “keep the lights on” cash needs.  We calculate this simply as the amount of cash required on a yearly basis to cover their living/family obligations without having to write checks out of savings to cover it.  Some CEO candidates may have 3 children in private school or college, while others may have no children and no mortgage.  Cash needs therefore may range widely, and need to be adjusted for using equity as a “leveler” (less cash-needy, higher the equity, and vice versa)
• * Alternatives to paying bonuses in cash might be to pay bonuses in equity, upon achievement of key milestones for the company
• * This same calculus can be applied to the Vice President level as well, subject to appropriate adjustments downward in cash and equity
• * In a circumstance where there is a “turn-around” required, equity may not be enough of a certainly to attract a competent CEO for the challenge ahead.  In these circumstances, a cash carve-out may be warranted in addition and/or in substitution for a stakeholder role.  The cash carve-out may be just for the CEO, or for the key management team required to achieve the turn-around.  Often, the cash-carve out structure is a percentage of total sale price over a certain amount, with the possibility for an accelerator depending upon exit/liquidity circumstances/outcome.
• * Often the question of anti-dilution comes up in an effort to assure a CEO of a certain percentage of equity upon liquidity.  Granting 5% equity to a CEO at a Series A financing with anti-dilution would ensure that the CEO retained his or her stake across the growth and additional funding needs of the company.  However, this is rarely a good mechanism, as the CEO becomes less interested in new company valuations at subsequent funding events, and becomes misaligned with the company’s investors.

I had Tuesday to Monday eve in mid-September in a race across the planet to take advantage of British Airways’ generous offer to fly a batch of entrepreneurs wherever they wanted to go in an effort to further each’s fast-growing businesses… at no cost.

My itinerary?  Starting from home base of Boston, then to New York’s JFK, through London, with the ultimate destination– Singapore.  Total air time one way? 18 hours.  Total air and waiting in airport time one way? 24 hours.

What earned me the opportunity?  First, membership in the Entrepreneurs’ Organization (“EO,” www.eonetwork.org, formerly known as YEO, or Young Entrepreneurs’ Organization ) a global membership organization that is nearing 10,000 members across more than a 100 chapters.  EO is one of a group of leadership organizations, including YPO, WPO, CEO, and several others.  Qualifications for EO membership include annual revenues of $1 million or more, and either founder or majority ownership status in your business.

Hailing from the Boston chapter of 100 or so EO members made up of computer software and hardware entrepreneurs, legal and staffing professional services business owners, and a host of other small business founders  including franchising, travel, consulting, real estate, and medical devices, I was made aware of the strategic partnership between British Airways and the EO organization.  The following paragraph, detailing what a face-to-face opportunity would mean to the growth and expansion of our boutique retained executive search firm, BSG Team Ventures, was what I jotted down–

We have a presence in Boston, New York, Silicon Valley, and London. These are key global innovation centers. However, there is clearly a fifth and/or sixth  location to round out our client value proposition of “on the ground coverage in the key innovation centers in the world”– and those are India and Asia. Although there is a term sometimes used that combines the two (“Chindia”), we feel that there is perhaps a need to be able to service our growth-stage clients in each. One alternative is a meaningful position in a location like Singapore, which is equidistant from both these key innovation markets.

The ability to set up a series of meetings with potential partners, and then bring pre-meeting calls and video conferences to an in-person, face-to-face setting, would be extremely meaningful in taking our business from EU-American only, to truly global, capable of better servicing the needs of our clients who continue to demand the need to themselves expand globally.

I had been to Singapore and Hong Kong in 2008 on business, and knew that another trip there would allow us to cement some developing relationships “face-to-face.”  In 2008, we completed a VP Worldwide Sales search based out of Singapore, and are now working on another General Manager search based out of Tokyo for a leading global technology innovator.  And with the recession of 2008-2009 projected to recover in west-bound fashion this time (Asia first, Europe second, and the U.S. last), China, Japan, and the rest of the Asia-Pacific corridor is important to every business, both large or small like ours.

Having won the right to cash in the BA offer, a plane load of entrepreneurs amassed down at JFK airport in New York.  BA was everything they’ve built their reputation on-service-oriented and courteous, only as the British can be-with a send off in the first-class lounge that was rich in food, spirit(s), networking with other entrepreneurs, and a few humor-filled greetings speeches by both British Airways officials and the British government.   Example of the power-networking in the BA lounge? I met up with Morgen Newman, co-founder of IdeaPaint, another Boston-based start-up that was a BA travel recipient, with a company out of Babson (my alma mater so plugging here) that has formulated a special paint that can be applied on any work surface that then functions as a “whiteboard,” completely erasable when using dry-erase markers.  IdeaPaint is a tool for entrepreneurs that simply brilliant.  Most entrepreneurs are visual thinkers, and this now allows us to scribble on every surface…. (“Beware office cleaners-these walls aren’t “dirty”…. DO NOT ERASE!”)

My itinerary and goals for the trip looked like the following: More…